System and method for high-speed image-cued triggering

ABSTRACT

A high-speed digital camera system and method for processing high-speed image data is claimed. The method comprises generating images with at least 3×10 5  pixels at greater than 200 frames-per-second with an image sensor, downloading an image from the image sensor; defining an area of interest in the downloaded image comprising a plurality of adjacent pixels in the image in which an event of interest is expected to occur, defining at least one threshold level for all pixels in the plurality; uploading the defined threshold level to a processor in the camera, retrieving pixel data in real time from the image sensor, and comparing within the camera the pixel data retrieved in real time from the image sensor to the defined threshold levels. A trigger is set when the threshold levels are exceeded and the camera records the event of interest and stores it in camera memory for outputting to a remote computer. The system comprises an image sensor capable of generating images with at least 3×10 5  pixels at greater than 200 frames-per-second, processing means capable of providing control signals to the image sensor and processing retrieved imagery in a parallel pipelined fashion, small memory for storing look-up tables or buffering data for external transmission, extended memory with which to store retrieved images capable of being overwritten in a circular buffer fashion, and a digital interface to connect to a host computer or network. The image sensor, processing means, small memory, extended memory, and digital interface are all housed within a single enclosure capable of extended communications with an external host computer or network.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates generally to the field of high-speed “smart” digital cameras, and specifically to a method of assessing imagery real-time in order to determine subsequent processing tasks to be performed inside the camera at frame-rates in excess of

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Digital cameras using rectangular arrays of photo-detector picture elements (pixels) are well-known in the art and are replacing film cameras in the fields of motion capture, bio-analysis, ordnance characterization, and missile development. Digital storage devices currently allow storage of terabyte (10¹² bytes) size files resulting in several minutes to hours of high-speed video. Digital cameras have numerous advantages over film cameras including the ability to display the imagery within a few seconds after recording. However, the costs associated with digital memory make long-time storage too expensive for many applications.

High-speed imagers typically have frame-rates of greater than 200 Hz and recent advances in semiconductor technology have enabled frame sizes of greater than one million pixels. Large-area field-programmable gate arrays have only recently achieved the speed and gate-count to control, direct, and store mega-pixel images at greater than 200 Hz frame-rate. High-speed digital cameras have limited on-board storage capacity because of the high rate of data transfer and because of the size, power consumption, and cost associated with available digital memories. In addition, even though the camera stores the entire image, there is relevant information in only a part of the image, leading to inefficient use of memory. High-speed digital cameras are especially impacted by this inefficiency because of the large data-rates needed for transferring imagery and the high costs of digital storage. A critical need in this arena is a “smart” high-speed camera that can make an assessment on a frame-by-frame basis of whether an image has relevant information and where the information is located within the image thereby storing only the frames or portion of frames that are of interest.

Another need is for a high-speed digital camera in which image acquisition, processing, and storage are all performed inside one enclosure, thereby reducing noise and complexity of installation, operation, and troubleshooting.

In addition, digital cameras used with conventional proximity sensors risk missing an event of interest. It would be desirable to have events of interest sensed based on information within the camera in order to increase the dynamic range, sensitivity, discrimination, and resolution of the sensing process.

It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a high-speed digital camera that samples imagery real-time and records only those frames or sequences of frames that are relevant, thus extending recording time over cameras with the same memory capacities.

It is another object of the present invention to provide a high-speed digital camera in which image acquisition, processing, and storage may all be performed inside one enclosure.

It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a camera that reduces the risk of missing an event-of-interest by sensing the event based on information within the camera, rather than utilizing external sensing means.

It is another object of the present invention to reduce the possibility of false positives detected by a digital camera in autonomous-sensing mode.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention achieves these objectives by providing a system and method to sample high-speed imagery (generally greater than 200 fps of greater than 3×10⁵ pixels) as it is acquired and generate a trigger within the camera based on the information content in an image before the next image is acquired. Such a trigger will be termed “image-cued trigger.” This image-cued trigger is used by the camera to start or stop the recording process. In the preferred embodiment, images are recorded from the imager to circular-buffer memory within the camera enclosure. The image-cued trigger can also designate X frames before the trigger and Y frames after the trigger to be stored for replay where X+Y is the total number of frames capable of fitting into the available on-board memory. The image-cued trigger can also be used as a flag to store or discard each individual image.

The present invention achieves these objectives by providing a system and method that senses the event with the same device used for recording, in which the trigger event is also recorded and may be reviewed for diagnostic purposes. The triggering event as determined by the image-cued trigger of the present invention can be discriminated over two spatial axes versus time unlike audio or proximity sensors whose signal is discriminated over one signal axis versus time. This additional axis of discrimination provides a higher level of reliability in triggering.

The system and method according to the present invention also minimizes false positives by defining two image-cued windows, an arming sequence, and a maximum delay between observed events in each window.

The present invention applies to self-contained image-acquisition systems (cameras) including large memory within the camera housing. During operation, imagery is recorded at a high (>200 fps) rate into the on-board large memory and subsequently transferred down a standard (e.g. USB, Firewire, Serial, Ethernet) digital interface at a lower rate. Alternatively, data may be written directly to external memory.

For purposes of summarizing the invention, certain aspects, advantages, and novel features of the invention have been described herein. It is to be understood that not necessarily all such advantages may be achieved in accordance with any one particular embodiment of the invention. Thus, the invention may be embodied or carried out in a manner that achieves or optimizes one advantage or group of advantages as taught herein without necessarily achieving other advantages as may be taught or suggested herein.

These and other embodiments of the present invention will also become readily apparent to those skilled in the art from the following detailed description of the embodiments having reference to the attached figures, the invention not being limited to any particular embodiment(s) disclosed.

DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is block diagram illustrating one embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 2 is a representation of a data window into which parameters for image-cued triggering are input by a user.

Repeat use of reference characters throughout the present specification and appended drawings is intended to represent the same or analogous features or elements of the invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The present invention and its advantages are best understood by referring to the drawings. The elements of the drawings are not necessarily to scale, emphasis instead being placed upon clearly illustrating the principles of the invention.

One embodiment of the camera 10 is represented schematically in FIG. 1. Parallel processor 12 and serial processor 13 perform the processing functions for the camera 10. There are two common techniques for processing high-speed imagery: “pipeline” and “parallel.” The pipeline technique adds latency to the processing time by requiring that the “pipeline” be filled before processing begins. Once filled, each sequential operation on the pipeline represents final processing of an image pixel. The parallel technique utilizes multiple processors running in parallel to accomplish image processing. The extreme example is a processor for each image pixel. However, this is unrealistic given the status of current technology and some reasonable number of parallel processors is designated to reach target image processing speeds. For large image arrays (>3×10⁵) at high frame-rates (>200 Hz), a combination of pipeline and parallel architectures is required for the common image processing tasks, and parallel processor 12 and serial processor 13 perform these functions.

In this figure, parallel processor 12 and serial processor 13 are shown as separate components, but the processing capability may also be provided by a single processing device. For example, the functionality of both parallel and serial processing capability may be achieved by using a large area field-programmable gate array (“FPGA”) such as the Xilinx Virtex FPGA with an embedded PowerPC module. Other processing devices, such as field-programmable object arrays (“FPOAs”), could be used instead.

In the illustrated embodiment, a small memory module 14 of typically less than 1 gigabyte is used to perform various functions such as buffering data packets for transmission over a digital interface, storing masks for image processing, and/or temporary storage of frames when acquiring imagery or retrieving stored frames from main camera memory. 4 MB of SRAM memory is used in one embodiment, though other types of memory may be used instead.

The primary or large camera memory 15 in this embodiment can be achieved using Dual Inline Memory Modules (DIMM) that can range in value from 4 MB to 64 GB. DIMM may consist of flash chips, SRAM, DRAM, or SDRAM. These types of memory are relatively inexpensive and common to the industry, though other forms of large memory may be used in other embodiments of the invention. If further storage is needed, a system of distributed disk drives external to the camera (not illustrated) is commonly used to achieve terabyte storage capacity.

In one embodiment of the invention, the parallel processor 12 provides the control signals to acquire an image from the image sensor 11, which in the preferred embodiment is a CMOS imager. Images are acquired from the CMOS imager on a pixel-by-pixel basis. Because of the time required to retrieve one row of an image from the imager, the parallel processor 12 and serial processor 13 have additional processing cycles at their disposal for adding, subtracting, multiplying, counting, and/or comparing pixel values. This excess processing margin enables the functions described in this patent. Both processors generally operate in a “pipelined” fashion in order to meet speed requirements. Internal parallel processor memory (not illustrated) is used to store threshold or comparator values with which each pixel is compared as it comes off the CMOS imager. If the pixel value is below a lower threshold or above an upper threshold, then the processor generates a trigger that starts or stops the recording process. This trigger can also be used to set a flag that controls whether each frame of the imagery is stored in large memory or discarded.

During autonomous image-cued trigger operation, the user pre-defines an image-cued window (“ICW”) in the field-of-view of the camera in which an event is expected to occur. For the purposes of this specification, the term “event of interest” or “expected event” refers to the high-speed event that is intended to be recorded (for example, a rocket launch). In one embodiment of the invention, the user can define the ICW either by dragging a mouse over an area of the image or by manually entering the upper-left/lower-right pixels from a remote computer. The ICW may be an area from 10×10 pixels to 1280×1024 pixels in one embodiment of the invention. Based on the quiescent pixel values in this ICW, the user defines upper and lower thresholds that are nominally 10-20% lower and higher, respectively, than the minimum and maximum quiescent pixel values. Motion in this ICW is interpreted as a dynamic change in grayscale value. The event to record is anticipated to produce at least one pixel grayscale value that drops below or exceeds these threshold values. The parallel processor compares each pixel in this area or interest (“AOI”) against an upper and lower threshold to determine whether the event has occurred. If any pixel grayscale value in this AOI either drops below the lower threshold or exceeds the upper threshold, an event is assumed to occur and a trigger is generated. With both upper and lower thresholds, a light object against a dark background moving into the image-cued window can be distinguished just as easily as a dark object against a light background. There are, however, applications in which a user may want only an upper or a lower threshold set, instead of both an upper and lower, and those applications are also within the scope of the present invention.

By way of example, FIG. 2 illustrates a data window that is configured to allow image cueing settings to be manually input by a user of the present invention. In this example, the user defined an ICW by inputting the upper left pixel row 1030 and column 212 and lower right pixel row 1199 and column 382. The software then reports for the defined ICW the absolute minimum and maximum pixel values present. If the minimum and maximum pixel values are 60 and 100, then a user may choose to set the lower trigger threshold level at 50 and the upper trigger threshold level at 110, as shown in FIG. 2. With these settings input, a trigger would be generated if any pixel in the image-cued area has a signal level below 50 or above 110.

As discussed above, the image-cued trigger may be used to start the recording process in the large memory, i.e., cause the large memory to stop overwriting the data being recorded in circular buffer fashion and to record the predetermined pre- and post-trigger sequences for downloading to a host computer. The image-cued trigger may also or alternatively be output directly to triggering equipment external to the camera.

The invention also permits the user to set how much of the allowable memory will be used to record the event post-trigger versus pre-trigger. In the example illustrated in FIG. 2, the user has configured the camera to record 95% post-trigger. This means that once the trigger is generated, 5% of the available memory will be filled with frames occurring before the trigger and 95% of available memory will be filled with post-trigger frames. During playback, the values in the image-cued trigger region can be observed on a frame-by-frame basis. This allows the user to determine exactly which frame generated the trigger.

In addition to the image-cued triggering as discussed herein, some embodiments of the present invention provide for triggering the recording process from an external trigger source. As with the image-cued triggering, the user can input the desired pre- and post-trigger recording percentages. In addition, the user specifies whether the recording should be triggered off the rising or falling edge of the trigger pulse. A user-defined delay determines how long after the trigger edge the first frame is captured. This delay typically ranges from 0.002 to 60,000 milliseconds and can be used in conjunction with the pre- and post-trigger settings. The external trigger is input to the camera in the form of a TTL pulse.

Another trigger option provided by the camera is a “frame sync” mode. In frame-synch mode, a trigger causes a single frame to be captured. In order to fill up the memory in frame-synch mode, the camera must see multiple trigger pulses. For example, filling up a 16 GB camera with megapixel imagery would require 16,000 triggers—each resulting in one image being stored. Once memory is full, the record process is stopped and frames can be downloaded. The frame sync mode works with an external TTL trigger pulse or with image-cued trigger. Prior art high-speed cameras have an image-cued trigger that samples one row out of the image at very high speed on a camera that has no large memory on board. When the pixels in that one row exceed a threshold condition, then the next frame is captured and stored. The frame sync mode of the present invention differs from the operation of the prior art cameras in that the actual frame that generates the trigger is the one stored.

The anticipated time-rate-of-change of pixel signal levels in the ICW can also be an important parameter in the operation of the present invention. The user defines this parameter based upon the anticipated event to be recorded. This parameter may be used by the camera to distinguish between changes in pixel levels based upon the actual anticipated high-speed event and changes in pixel levels that can be caused by slowly varying intensity levels over time (e.g., the sun going behind a cloud). The camera has an auto-exposure feature that samples the average intensity of each image during the recording process and varies the electronic shutter between each consecutive frame to keep the average intensity close to the target average intensity. The auto-exposure feature has its own trigger based upon a slow rate of change, while the image-cued trigger operates at a much faster rate of change. The triggered time-rate-of-change of pixel signal levels for the auto-exposure feature is typically ≦5% of the pixel signal level from one frame to the next. For image-cued trigger operation, the typical time-rate-of-change per frame is ≧10%.

Because the image-cued trigger as discussed above may be susceptible to false positives such as a glint of sunlight, bird, car, or other interference, one embodiment of the invention utilizes two ICW's to reduce or eliminate the possibility of false positives. In the case of a false positive, thresholds defining an image-cued event are exceeded by something other than the event of interest. As a method of greatly reducing false positive image-cued triggers, this embodiment has two separate, independent image-cued windows—one of which has to be armed before the other can generate the trigger. Both image-cued windows generally have upper and lower thresholds for each pixel. However, an out-of-threshold event in the second ICW does not generate a trigger unless the first ICW has already seen its event. In this manner, a bird flying through the field of view left-to-right would not trigger image-cued settings for a missile flying right-to-left. Similarly, an out-of-threshold event in the first ICW that is not observed in the second ICW will not generate a trigger; nor will an event that is observed only in the second ICW. Three or more ICW's may also be used in a similar manner.

The anticipated time-rate-of-change is used in the two-ICW configuration to define the delay maximum delay between the first and second ICW events, after which a spurious event is assumed and both are armed again. Typical delays are a few hundred microseconds to several milliseconds. Similarly, the second ICW would be re-armed after a spurious event observed only in it. Using this feature would eliminate false triggers by events that occur outside of the anticipated time-rate-of-change window. For example a bird flying through the image cued windows in the proper order would take longer then the maximum delay that was set for a missile launch and would therefore not cause a trigger.

Various functions can be implemented on each pixel or row of pixels before the next pixel or row of pixels is required to be read out. These functions realize several advantages that extend recording time, reduce memory requirements, or a combination of one or more of these.

The digital camera according to the present invention can also simulate the operation of several cameras with one by sensing multiple events and storing high-speed video from each to different memory locations. For example, with a traditional 16 GB high speed digital camera, a user may be able to record only thirty seconds of a rocket launch. The present invention allows a user to divide the available memory into multiple “chunks” of memory, for example, into eight chunks of memory, each 2 GB long, and could thus record multiple launches with one camera. In order to accomplish this, the user could set an ICW at the exit of the rocket launcher, and specify that 2 GB of frames be recorded at each launch. After the camera records the first launch, it would resets and record seven more 2 GB launch events. Without the functionality afforded by the present invention, eight cameras would be required to record eight launches at high speed.

This invention may be provided in other specific forms and embodiments without departing from the essential characteristics as described herein. The embodiment described is to be considered in all aspects as illustrative only and not restrictive in any manner.

As described above and shown in the associated drawings and exhibits, the present invention comprises a high-speed smart camera and method for high-speed image-cued triggering. While particular embodiments of the invention have been described, it will be understood, however, that the invention is not limited thereto, since modifications may be made by those skilled in the art, particularly in light of the foregoing teachings. It is, therefore, contemplated by the appended claims to cover any such modifications that incorporate those features or those improvements that embody the spirit and scope of the present invention. 

1. A method for processing high-speed digital images, comprising the steps of: a. generating images with an image sensor within a high-speed digital camera; b. downloading an image from the image sensor to a remote computer; c. defining an imaged-cued window comprising an area of interest in the downloaded image, the area of interest comprising a plurality of adjacent pixels in the image in which an event of interest is expected to occur; d. defining a threshold level for all pixels in the plurality, wherein the threshold level is at least one of: an upper threshold and a lower threshold; e. uploading the defined threshold level to a processor within the camera.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the images generated by the image sensor are at least 3×10⁵ pixels at greater than 200 frames-per-second.
 3. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step of defining an anticipated time-rate-of-change of pixel signal levels.
 4. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step of retrieving pixel data in real time from the image sensor.
 5. The method of claim 4, further comprising the step of comparing within the camera the pixel data retrieved in real time from the image sensor to the defined threshold level.
 6. The method of claim 5, further comprising writing images retrieved from the image sensor in real time to large memory within the camera housing while the comparison is being performed.
 7. The method of claim 6, further comprising the step of generating within the camera an image-cued trigger signal if pixel data retrieved in real time from the image sensor exceeds the threshold level.
 8. The method of claim 7, further comprising the step of outputting the image-cued trigger signal to trigger external equipment.
 9. The method of claim 7, further comprising the step of recording real-time image data in the large memory and continuously overwriting it in circular buffer fashion until a trigger level is set.
 10. The method of claim 9, further comprising the step of defining the portion of the available memory to be allocated to pre-trigger recording and post-trigger recording.
 11. The method of claim 10, further comprising the step of outputting to a remote computer the defined portions of pre-trigger and post-trigger images.
 12. The method of claim 9, wherein an address of memory in the circular buffer of large memory is decremented or incremented by one frame count when a trigger is received.
 13. The method of claim 7, wherein multiple separate blocks of large memory are reserved for storage of multiple separate image sequences following detection of multiple separate out-of-threshold image-cued trigger events.
 14. The method of claim 7, wherein multiple separate extended memory blocks are reserved for storage of multiple separate image sequences following detection of either out-of-threshold image-cued trigger events or a combination of external trigger events and image-cued trigger events.
 15. The method of claim 6, wherein the processor is armed when pixel data retrieved in real time from the image sensor exceeds the threshold level.
 16. The method of claim 15, further comprising the step of defining a second image-cued window and generating a trigger when data retrieved in real time from the image sensor for the second image-cued window exceeds the threshold level if the processor is armed.
 17. The method of claim 16, further comprising the step of defining a maximum delay between image-cued window events and resetting the sequence when a first ICW is armed but a second ICW does not trigger before the expiration of the user-defined maximum delay.
 18. The method of claim 15, in which multiple image-cued windows are armed in a specific sequence before a recording trigger can be generated.
 19. A system for processing real-time digital images comprising: an image sensor capable of generating images with at least 3×10⁵ pixels at greater than 200 frames-per-second; processing means capable of providing control signals to the image sensor and processing retrieved imagery in a parallel pipelined fashion; small memory for storing look-up tables or buffering data for external transmission; extended memory with which to store retrieved images capable of being overwritten in a circular buffer fashion; and a digital interface to connect to a host computer or network; wherein the image sensor, processing means, small memory, extended memory, and digital interface are all housed within a single enclosure capable of extended communications with an external host computer or network.
 20. A computer readable medium configured with control logic that causes a computer processor to execute the method comprising the steps of: a. generating images with an image sensor within a high-speed digital camera; b. downloading an image from the image sensor to a remote computer; c. defining an imaged-cued window comprising an area of interest in the downloaded image, the area of interest comprising a plurality of adjacent pixels in the image in which an event of interest is expected to occur; d. defining a threshold level for all pixels in the plurality, wherein the threshold level is at least one of: an upper threshold and a lower threshold; e. uploading the defined threshold level to a processor within the camera. 